Category Archives: Topps

Topps Files Trademark for GPK Phlushers

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Will you soon be able to cuddle with your Garbage Pail Kids? According to Paul Lesko, Topps recently filed for a trademark for GPK Phlushers. Lesko is known for following and reporting on all the legal happenings in the trading card industry. The application was filed on 5/18/22, and covers dolls, stuffed toys, plush toys, and toy figurines. Is Topps considering getting into the stuffed toy market? A trademark doesn’t mean a product is a for sure thing, but does give some insight into what Topps might be working on.

Garbage Pail Kids Collector Featured on History Channel Show

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If you collect Garbage Pail Kids you probably are a child of the 1980’s. The new History Channel show, Adam Eats the 80’s, brings back all the nostalgia around food from that decade. Episode 2, Only in the 80’s, features the candy collection of long time Garbage Pail Kids collector, Russell Vandiver (RusVan). The host of the show is Adam Richman, you may recognize Adam from various food channel shows such as Man vs. Food. The show features Adam traveling across the country to relive popular food items from the 80’s.

In the second episode of the show, the last two segments feature what is probably the largest vintage candy collection in the US. GPK collectors might recognize the owner of that collection, Russell Vandiver. Russell has been a long time member of the GPK collecting community. He was part of the old GPKUG forums, and continues to be an active part of various Facebook groups. Russell is also the foremost expert on GPK Cheap Toys from the 80’s. The show spends a lot of time on his GPK collection both cards and Cheap Toys.

The segment with Russell was filmed in November of last year. Producers decided to film only part of the collection! Filming was done on the living room displays, while other parts of his collection reside in the loft and spare bedroom of his house. GPKNews asked Russell how the spot on the show came about, “I had a buyer in my GARBAGE ARCHIVE store for several years that turned out to be a producer, who was pitching a new show about food from the 80’s.  History took it, and then they contacted Topps and asked Topps if they could film on their location. Topps said they have almost nothing of their old candy lines and then signed a rights document over to me, so that I could represent Topps for this program. This then lead to an interview, which lead to me sending pics and them forming a script.  During this process I had to fight to get some of the attention at least off candy and get GPK, and mainly Cheap Toys mentioned.  Unfortunately, in post-production Topps changed their mind and said they did not want to be mentioned in the show, which meant almost 95% of my lines were cut because all day I talked about Topps!  Also if you notice, they cropped out most of the Topps logos in the images, but they did miss a few.”

While the filming took a long 13 hours, Russell had a great time with Adam and the producers, “Incredible, the energy coming off this guy was nothing I’ve ever experienced.  I realized why he hosts a bunch of different shows, Adam is amazing!” The edpsode first aired on The History Channel on Feb. 27, 2022, and is now available to watch online through your local cable company or Amazon Prime Video.

Garbage Pail Kids to be Part of Topps International Trading Card Day

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Card shop owners from across the country are gathered this week in Arizona for the yearly Topps Industry Summit. This year’s conference has featured both Topps employees with Fanatics leadership discussing how the trading card industry moves forward. As usual, the discussions and news coming from the conference is focused on baseball and other sports properties that Topps manages. However, there’s always a nugget or two of Garbage Pail Kids information that comes from the show. Today, during one of Topps presentations, information was shared on Topps plans for this year’s International Trading Card Day. Previously, National Trading Card day, was only available in the US and focused on baseball cards. Topps is expanding the skope and presence of the event this year. On August 6th collectors in the US, UK, Japan, and Germany will be able to go into a participating hobby store and pick out a free pack of either MLB, UEFA, Star Wars, or Garbage Pail Kids cards. The cards for this type of event are usually specifically for the event, so collectors can expect something new. Mark your calendars and plan to get to your local hobby store on 8/6/22!

Tom Bunk Featured in 2021 Topps Allen & Ginter Set

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Original Series Garbage Pail Kids artist Tom Bunk is featured in the upcoming 2021 Topps Allen & Ginter release. Thanks to collector Jeremy Lawson for first posting information about the card, and sending along pictures. Topps has been releasing Allen & Ginter (A&G) sets since 2006. While the sets primarily are focused on baseball players, they always include a number of celebrities and people of interest within the set. Bunk is card #250 in the regular base card set. The back of the card reviews Tom’s history of working for Mad Magazine and creating GPKs and Wacky Packages. It wouldn’t be Topps, if there also wasn’t a handful of parallels of the card to collect. Besides the base card, there are also regular sized Glossy (1/1) and Silver Portrait (Hobby Only) parallels. There are also a slew of mini parallels. The card can be found in Mini (1:1), A&G Back Mini (1:5), Black Mini (1:10), No Number mini (/50), Brooklyn Back (/25), Glossy (1/1), Wood (Hobby 1/1), and Framed Printing Plates (1/1). Cards have been showing up online this weekend, but the official release date for 2021 Topps Allen & Ginter is 8/11/21.

Topps Taking Company Public In Merger With Mudrick Capital

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Topps announced today they will be merging with Mudrick Capital Acquisition Corporation and taking taking the company public. The deal is expected to close late 2nd quarter or early 3rd quarter, and values the company at $1.3 billion. Once the deal closes the company will trade on the NASDAQ market under the TOPP symbol. Current Chairman, Michael Eisner, and current CEO, Michael Brandstaedter, will remain in their current rolls with the company. Previous owners, Madison Dearborn Partners will be exiting the company, while Eisner will convert his equity and become the company’s largest shareholder. The company was previously a public company prior to Eisner and Dearborn purchasing it in 2007. To read the fulls details of the deal, visit the release on Topps Investor website.

How does this involve Garbage Pail Kids you wonder? Well besides being made by Topps, today’s release by the company gives some insight to the business, and how the company perceives the brand. As part of an investor slideshow the Garbage Pail Kids brand is listed as one of the company’s key brands, along with MLB, Star Wars, WWE, Formula 1, and UEFA. The is high praise for a brand that was in mothballs just 11 years ago, and was seen as a niche brand.

Additionally, throughout the presentation and in media interviews today, the company and Eisner pushed hard their move to digital and NFTs. Topps clearly sees NFTs as the future of the company. While physical cards aren’t going anywhere, there will be a huge push in 2021 and 2022 into the NFT space. The Garbage Pail Kids brand was called out throughout the presentation for being the guinea pig for NFTs during 2020. It’s also interesting to note the company did $567 million in revenues in 2020, which was a 23% increase over 2019. The company expects to do $692 million in 2021. Currently Topps reports 55% of revenues come from physical trading cards, 6% from digital, and the remaining from their candy and gift card businesses.

Contact your stock broker today, soon you too can own a piece of Topps!

Topps Looking for New GPK Brand Manager as Jessica Kanzer Leaves Topps

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GPKNews has learned that Garbage Pail Kids Brand Manager Jessica Kanzer is no longer with Topps. Sources say Jessica left Topps a couple weeks ago for an opportunity in another field. Jessica had been leading the retail releases for GPK. She took over for previous brand manager Colin Walton in mid-2018. She oversaw all the retail sets since 2018S2, including the recently released 35th Anniversary and Chrome OS 3 releases. In addition to GPK, Jessica worked on Topps’ entertainment properties like Wacky Packages, WWE, and Star Wars.

According to a Topps spokesperson, the Brand Manager team is working to cover Jessica’s former responsibilities until a replacement is hired. There is currently a listing for Brand Manager – Entertainment on Topps’ job website. The change in leadership is not expected to cause any delays with releases. Work was already completed on 2021S1 Food Fight before her resignation. While no future sets have been officially announced, work continues uninterrupted on 2021S2 by the GPK artists. The GPK brand is exploding in popularity, whomever takes over will have the chance to lead Topps’ entertainment properties through these times.

More Info on 2021 Topps Baseball Series 1 Garbage Pail Kids Insert

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With the official release of 2021 Topps Series Baseball tomorrow, boxes are already being busted and cards have started appearing on eBay. As announced on the checklist last week, the History of Topps Insert Set within the series contains a Garbage Pail Kids card celebrating the launch of the brand in 1985. Thanks to collector Joshua for sending along pictures of the card. The card features the iconic Adam Bomb OS 1 card on the front. The card is numbered HOT-5. GPK collectors looking for the card should be aware the card comes in multiple parallels. In addition to the base card, there is also Blue, Black (/299), Platinum Anniversary (/70), Red (/10), and Gold (1/1). As you can see below from some of the early odds, the card will not be an easy pull, especially the parallels.

History of Topps Odds

Retail

  • Base 1:74
  • Blue – 1:2,568
  • Black – 1:5,136
  • Platinum Anniversary – 1:22,055
  • Red – 1:124,796

Hanger Boxes

  • Base 1:19
  • Blue – 1:614
  • Black – 1:1,234
  • Platinum Anniversary – 1:5,289
  • Red – 1:37,019

Blaster

  • Base 1:75
  • Blue – 1:2,347
  • Black – 1:5,891
  • Platinum Anniversary – 1:25,414
  • Red – 1:177,889

Jumbo Hobby

  • Base 1:19
  • Blue – 1:894
  • Black – 1:1,970
  • Platinum Anniversary – 1:7,662
  • Red – 1:54,484

2021 Topps Series 1 Baseball to Feature Garbage Pail Kids Card

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The flagship baseball card set for Topps is scheduled to feature a Garbage Pail Kids card. According to the checklist released today for 2021 Series 1 Topps Baseball, there will be a card commemorating the launch of the Garbage Pail Kids. The card will be part of the History of Topps insert set that helps celebrate the 70th anniversary of Topps making cards. There is no info on what artwork will be on the card. The checklist shows it will be card #HOT-5. Collectors will want to keep their eyes open on the secondary market. 2021 Topps Series 1 Baseball is set to be released 2/10/21.

Philly Non-Sport Virtual Call Features Topps Announcments

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COVID-19 wasn’t able to stop Topps news from coming out at the Philly Non-Sports card show. The show is being held virtually this weekend. Today’s first virtual card talk session featured Topps Ira Friedman and Jessica Kanzer. The call was hosted by show promoter Harris Tosar.

Topps VP of licensing Ira Friedman took the first half of the call to go over all the various licensing efforts Topps is working on for Garbage Pail Kids. Ira told collectors Topps is focused on making GPK a global brand. He first reviewed a number of products that are for the core GPK collector. USAopoly is planning to release two new puzzles in 2021, plus a new unannounced product. There will be 3 new Geekitikis in the second series coming in Nov. Funko will release new POPs in early 2021. Greenlight will have the already announced 3rd series of die-cast cars in 2021. Ira showed off the GPK playing card deck during the talk. He said they would be sold at both FYE and ToyNK. He also showed the recent playing card coins from GPKNation, and talked about their weekly limited releases. He also had the Super7 reaction figure of Adam Bomb, and said he hoped it would lead to more figures.

Next Ira spoke of products that were focused on a broader audience. He mentioned the continued FYE consumables they continue to come out with. The Wal-Mart GPK advent calendar was shown. Ira said the calendar will be sold in 900 stores nationwide. He then talked about trying to being GPKs to kids. Part of that will include two more announcements with toy companies coming in 2021, that will focus on products to bring kids into the hobby. Finally, in some big news, Ira said they are working on various video game initiatives, and there will be some announcements in 2021.

Ira then went on to talk about the various partnerships they are working on. He said there would be a new partnership announcement in Dec. for 2021. He then talked about the success of the RL Stine book, and being #7 on this weeks NY Times kids best seller list. He showed off the audio version of the book, featured on 6 CDs. He mentioned there will be more books on the way from RL Stine. Finally he said their stop motion partnership with Jam Roll Studios is continuing. There is an upcoming much longer 3 part videos series coming out soon from the company. The first part 3 1/2 min video will debut this December. Part 2 will come in the first quarter of 2021, with part 3 in the 2nd quarter.

Finally Ira talked about global expansion. He said various GPK products would be offered in other countries that have supported GPK. He also mentioned in 2021 they are working on new card sets for other countries featuring not only existing, but new artwork as well.

Next to speak was Topps Entertainment Brand Manager Jessica Kanzer. Jessica started by giving an overview of the upcoming 35th anniversary set. Jessica showed a picture of the Garbage Can Tin that will be the box on the Collector boxes. She mentioned there are two versions, one will be limited. Next she talked about the Chrome OS 3 set. In addition to the OS 3 base cards, there are nine new pieces that were created for the set. She said Tom Bunk signed a number of cards for the set, but they were not able to get John Pound to sign autos this time. She mentioned she is also excited for the 2021S1 Food Fight release, and work is starting for the second half releases in 2021.

Jessica also talked about some upcoming releases for topps.com. The second series of Trashy Treasures will be coming in Nov. She showed off one of the figures, Nat Nerd. She said there will be a Halloween themed release on 10/22, with two additional holiday themed releases planned for the rest of the year. She also said the weekly GPK card sets would continue in 2021 with a different theme.

Topps doesn’t speak often on GPK so this was incredible insight being shared with collectors. Hats off to the Philly Non-Sport promoters for putting the talk together. The show has 6 more various non-sport related talks scheduled through the weekend.

Topps Going All In in 2020 for Garbage Pail Kids 35th Anniversary

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According to an article published yesterday in ICV2.com, Topps is planning a huge push next year for Garbage Pail Kids and their 35th anniversary. Topps has big plans with both licensees and promotions.

New licensees will include USAopoly, they will produce a GPK themed Monopoly board game. Abrams book publisher will be back, this time with middle-school themed books. Previously announced companies Chalkline and Just Funky will join a new name, Surreal Entertainment, in producing licensed merchandise. The previous licensees; Geeki Tikis, Super 7, Ripple Junction, Mondo, FYE Consumables, Creepy Co., Fright Rags, are also mentioned as coming out with new items in 2020.

For the first time in years, Topps will actually put some marketing power behind the brand. According to the article Topps will be sending GPK characters to trade shows and comic conventions next year. The article also mentioned they will be showcasing the art and the artists at those shows. Also Topps is planning on launching dedicated social media channels, and a new website.

Finally mentioned in the article, and confirmed by Jam Studios, Topps has agreed to partner with Jam Studios to being a “whole batch” of new animated GPK shorts. Strangely, there was no mention os plans for the actual card sets in 2020. Buckle in, next year is going to be busy…